Friday, August 24, 2012

Maybe it's time to think about outlawing all things digital, including the web, smartphones, tablets and anything else that depends one ones and zeros. What better way to spur on a growth of print publications like newspapers and magazines.

Well, that was what came to mind when I heard that the Republican platform to be adopted in Tampa next week will include a call for a return to the gold standard. Exactly how far into the past the GOP wants to send America is anybody's guess, but there really needs to be something in that platform for us media types.

Media executives know what it's like to fear the future (and the present, too), too. Many publishers and other media execs are not exactly thrilled with a future that involves self-publishing, constantly new digital platforms being introduced, the loss of the traditional newsstand, etc.

Most just try to adapt the best they can, while others actually are leading the charge towards the new digital platforms (they must be communists, suffragists or something).

So as many Americans dream of a nation where gull bladder surgery costs two chickens and a gallon of unpasteurized milk, maybe it is time we publishing types started pressing for our own nostalgic vision of our industry.

So I am, right here and now, calling on the GOP to put the following in their platforms: the outlawing of all things digital and a return to the penny press.

Yes, it's time to realize that only through the steady progression of regression can we move backwards towards to new prosperity. So to all my media colleagues, let's pressure those conventioneers into slipping something for us into their campaign platform. Let's make sure we get this done before Apple introduces yet another new fangled gadget that gets the population all a twitter, and leads to yet more digital downloads.

Wind up the Victrola and sing along with me (to the melody of Yes, We Have No Bananas):

Yes, we have no tablets
We have-a no tablets today
The newspapers they're-a buyin',
Thanks to our guy Paul Ryan,
We have an old fashioned Selectric
But hardly any electric
But yes, we have no tablets
We have no tablets today!

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